What're We Gonna Do?
by PaleBloodInk
Summary: The members of team RNJR are on the path to Mistral, hoping to find Cinder and find out why she attacked Beacon. But as Ruby and Jaune are left alone around the campfire, Jaune asks a simple question. "What are we going to do when we find Cinder?"


It was just another night for team RNJR. Nora and Ren had wandered off to gather more firewood, leaving Ruby and Jaune alone around the campfire. Ruby was performing regular maintenance on Crescent Rose, and Jaune was disinterestedly polishing Crocea Mors.

After a good fifteen minutes of silence Jaune put down his sword and spoke up. "Hey, Ruby?"

"Yeah, Jaune?" replied Ruby, still focused on her own weapon.

"I need to ask you something," he said, sounding almost nervous.

"Sure, shoot."

"What are we going to do when we find Cinder?"

That caused Ruby to shift her attention from her weapon to the blonde knight. "I'm sorry, could you repeat that?"

"What are we going to do when we find Cinder?" Jaune repeated.

Ruby paused for a second, almost confused by the question. "Er, Jaune, we're going after Cinder to find out why she attacked Vale."

Jaune shook his head, realizing his mistake. "Sorry. What I mean is… after we find out why she did it, what are we going to do with her?"

Ruby's eyes slowly widened as she realized what Jaune was asking. "Jaune, are you asking whether or not we're going to kill Cinder?"

Jaune didn't respond. He simply sat there, looking into the campfire.

"Jaune," repeated Ruby in a firm tone, "are you asking if we're going to kill Cinder?"

A few seconds passed before Jaune answered, "Yeah."

Ruby carefully put down Crescent Rose before asking, "What made you ask this all of a sudden?"

Jaune shook his head. "This isn't the first time I've thought about this. I've been thinking about it for a while now."

The two let that statement hang in the air for a moment. Jaune continued to stare at the campfire, and Ruby stared at him, wondering how to word her response. She cleared her throat before replying, "Since you asked, I wasn't planning on killing her. Heck, I haven't really thought about what we we're gonna do with her beyond finding out why she attacked Vale."

Jaune visibly grimaced at this. Seeing his displeasure, Ruby quickly continued. "But, if I had to come up with a plan right now, we could always bring her to Mistral's military. They could probably keep her locked up."

Her attempt at pacifying him didn't seem to work. The grimace didn't leave his face, and he continued to stare at the campfire. Ruby bit her bottom lip in thought before asking, "So, why have you been thinking about this a lot?"

Even as the statement was leaving her mouth, she realized how obvious the answer was. "Pyrrha?" she guessed.

The grimace finally left his face. He let out a sigh and looked up at Ruby. "She's… part of the reason." He took a deep breath and continued. "At first Pyrrha was the only reason I thought about… y'know, killing Cinder. But after a while I started thinking about how bad things have gotten. The CCT's been knocked down, the Grimm are more vicious than ever, and I can't even imagine how many people have lost their homes." Jaune's hands tightened into fists as he continued. "But the thing that really gets to me, the part that makes me absolutely hate Cinder, is the fact that hundreds of people had to go through losing someone on top of everything else. Every time we see some settlement that's been raided by the Grimm, I remember that these people, and so many people in Vale, lost someone important to them; and now they're going through what you and I are going through, but worse. And for so many of them, the root of their suffering boils down to one person. That's why I keep thinking about what we need to do with Cinder."

Jaune looked at Ruby to see her response. For a moment the two just stared at one another until Ruby broke eye contact. She picked Crescent Rose back up and resumed maintenance. As she did, she said, "I'm not gonna say that killing her isn't what Pyrrha would want; you knew her better than any of us, so you already know what she'd want. I will say this, however. Cinder framed Yang, and," she paused and took a deep breath, "and tricked Pyrrha into killing Penny, so that people would get angry and afraid. Even if that was just to attract the Grimm, I think if we start to let ourselves be changed or controlled by anger, we'd be doing something she wants. I think the only way we can beat her, is not be being better than her, but by being better than she expects us to be."

"So, if we kill her she wins, huh?" Jaune asked in almost resigned tone.

Ruby let out a sigh, "Probably."

"True," Jaune admitted begrudgingly. "Alright, but here's my main problem with locking her up. She didn't attack Vale by herself. She's got people working with her, and these people are likely pretty smart. If we leave her in some jail cell, it won't be long before they come up with a plan to break her out. Then she'll be free spread all this fear and hate all over again."

"That's… a good point too," Ruby admitted. "So, I guess, short of a miracle happening, she wins no matter what we do."

Jaune nodded his head sadly. "I guess so."

Silence once more permeated the air. The two kept thinking over their conversation, hoping to find some major fault that would give them a clear answer on what to do. Both them let out a tired sigh. "Maybe not thinking about what we're gonna do was the right plan after all," said Jaune, tiredly.

Ruby shook her head. "No, we needed to talk about this. Although, we should talk about this with Ren and Nora. Who knows, maybe Nora will have some crazy idea that's just crazy enough to work."

"Heh. Maybe."

Jaune picked Crocea Mors back up and began to polish it again, and Ruby shifted all of her attention back to her beloved Crescent Rose. On the outside the two wore neutral expressions. On the inside, however, they were praying that their friends might have some idea of how to handle Cinder. Because they certainly didn't.


End file.
